Little Orphan Echolls
by bminor
Summary: Logan refuses to talk about the effects of Aaron's death, even to Veronica. Veronica decides, for once, not to push and is annoyed to find that the approach seems to work. She's also surprised to find that it makes him more affectionate than normal, even in public. Rated M for language and adult stuff.


**A/N:** This is my first time venturing into lemon territory, so please be kind if it's not great! I just really wanted to write a piece that filled the gap between twirlykisses in the season 2 finale and sexytimes in early season 3. Hope you enjoy!  
 **Disclaimer:** the characters are not my own, I make no money off of this, etc etc.

…

"Just call me Little Orphan Echolls," he joked, a wry smile placed carefully on his face.

Veronica had heard this line numerous times in the three weeks since Aaron Echolls had received a swift bullet to the back of his head. Any time someone had tried to give Logan their awkward, unsure condolences, he made the same joke, and plastered on the same practiced smile. She had to admire his consistency; he had it down to a fine art. Even used the same cadence each time, adding a lilt on the word 'little'. It made people feel awkward – too awkward to carry on the conversation, and it definitely avoided any further pity being sent his way.

If they thought about it, people didn't even know what they were offering him.

"We're so sorry for your loss." _Really? Seems like the world is better off.  
_ "We were so sad to hear about what happened." _Were you? All I feel is relief._  
"How are you doing after….everything?" _You mean how he fucked and murdered my girlfriend? And then tried again? Or how he lied through his teeth about the whole damn thing?_

As always, his line had the intended effect and the valet suddenly became very focussed on matching their ticket stub with right keys. Veronica gently raised a hand to the small of his back and stroked small circles into his soft, worn tshirt. It was the most comforting thing she could ever think of to do without drawing unwanted attention – God forbid he should let anybody think he'd been affected by it. Better to let everyone think he was a snarky asshole than admit he was vulnerable at all.

Well, not quite everyone. They had slept in the same bed for the past two weeks, and there were some things you couldn't hide. For the first few nights, Logan dove into protector mode as always, enveloping her whenever she woke up crying, whispering reassuring words into her ear and stroking her hair until she fell asleep again. Even the 10 or so hours Veronica had believed her own father was dead had left her unconscious brain with enough ammo to give her nightmares, let alone what had happened on that roof.

But Veronica being Veronica, soon enough she had found a way to deal with it. Her standard method of 'dealing' was equal parts move on, pretend it didn't happen, and try to get even. Not exactly the healthiest way of dealing, but so far it had worked well enough. Kinda.

Her nightmares subsided, and what replaced them were the stressful 'can't figure out the case' dreams she was used to. Weirdly, she was fine with that particular brand of R.E.M. considering the alternative. After a week and a half she had even relaxed to the point where she slept pretty well. Getting to sleep next to Logan was still a novelty, and one that would end as soon as Keith's case was done and he returned to Nepture.

On their eleventh night sleeping next to each other, she had been woken in the early hours. A quick glance at the bedside clock told her it was 2:38am. She took a quick stock of herself; no pounding heart, no terror sweats, and she hadn't been crying. It took her a second to realise that the bed was shaking a little. She sat up slowly, trying to adjust her eyes to the dim light of the bedroom. A quick glance over at Logan to see whether he was awake made her breath catch in her throat. He was shaking in his sleep, his breathing jagged and shallow. Veronica wasn't sure she'd ever seen him look so…small.

She felt a pang of guilt for not realising how much he'd been pushing down to take care of her. He wasn't exactly an open book, and she knew him well enough to know that he wasn't fine, but…it was easy to underestimate how chaotic he was inside considering how much practice he'd had hiding it. Her brain tried to decide which of the recent tragedies was haunting him as he slept. Where to fucking start.

 _How are you doing after...everything?_

The frustrating truth, was that it was everything. Pain from individual skewerings clamoured for attention, adding weight to the whole, fucked up mess.

"Logan?" she whispered, not wanting to startle him any further. "Logan, wake up." She gently squeezed his arm and nudged a little.

He woke with a sharp intake of breath, taking a few seconds to realise where he was after registering the familiar landmarks of her bedroom. Neither of them had wanted to go back to the Neptune Grand just yet – for obvious reasons - despite the benefits of housekeeping service, and neither of them were complaining about the fact that her single bed meant they slept close to each other each night.

"Logan?"

"What's wrong, are you okay?" he croaked, his voice full of concern for her.

"Yeah I'm fine…are you…okay?" _Talk about asking a stupid question_ , she thought.

She brought her thumb to his face to brush away some of the damp evidence on his cheeks. She looked into his worried eyes, her own full of not-yet-vocalised love, hoping he wouldn't feel the need to put on the same bullshit show for her that he did for everyone else.

He took in a long, depth breath and answered "I'm fine. Thanks." A small, weak smile accompanied it. "C'mere." He took her hand, motioning for her to lie down, then pulled her in close and rested his head on top of hers, breathing in her comforting scent.

 _Okay, Echolls, you don't want to talk about it, we'll go with that. For now._

During the week following, Veronica made an effort to go a little easy on him. She hadn't needed to wake him again, but she knew from experience that the images which haunt you can be…persistent. Logan remained reluctant to talk about it; whenever she gently suggested that he might not be feeling peachy about 'everything' he quickly changed the subject, usually to something he knew she found it difficult to resist talking about.

She was well aware of this trick. She'd used it on Duncan more times than she was proud of…okay, she was a little proud. Of course Duncan never had any idea what she was doing. Let's just say she now knew a lot more about Italian yachts than she ever wanted to know.

Even so, Veronica didn't call Logan out on it, and she didn't push. Raised her eyebrows and gave him a look that said ' _don't think I don't know what you're doing, buddy'_? Obviously. But she played along. She had made a conscious decision that the best way to be there for him was to be a slightly better version of herself. She could be a great PI and weasel it out of him, or she could be a great girlfriend; it couldn't be both. So she made her choice, and did her best to stick to it, despite the constant nagging feeling that she wanted to know, to talk, to do something – to _fix_ it.

To her mild annoyance, the approach seemed to be working pretty well. Although he said nothing, it hadn't escaped his attention that she was holding back from her default PI mode. He knew her too well, flaws and all, and understood the effort she required not to push. Apart from anything else, he could read her face like a damn instruction manual. It was a canvas for frustration, suppressed sarcasm and exasperation, her emotions wrestling with themselves in the few seconds it took her to bite her lip and settle on…love? That's what Logan thought he saw, and didn't care if it was foolish to hope that's what it was.

Either way, she was trying. Consequently, he had become particularly affectionate with her. She had reminded him on more than one occasion that Keith Mars' eyes are everywhere, which had helped to keep his affection on the sweeter side – twirling her around, stroking her hair. They were both well aware of how others might find this G-rated version of their relationship kind of sickly sweet, partially due to the vomit noises Mac made whenever a 'group hang' turned into Logan kissing each of Veronica's individual fingers in turn, and Veronica grinning up at him like a delirious idiot.

Of course there were also times when he pressed her up against a wall in a quiet corner and kissed her deeply, the heat rising between them as she lifted his shirt and lightly traced shapes on his belly, sometimes tracing just underneath the waistband of his pants. It drove him crazy, and it took all his will power (and the knowledge that Papa Mars was never far away) not to unbutton her jeans right there. Wanting to wait until she was absolutely ready, these exchanges usually ended in him breaking away and having to think about baseball for a minute or two before they could get back to doing whatever they were doing before they'd been lured in by a wall. Sneaky wall.

At the start of their fourth week together, Veronica took his hand and pulled him into the secluded alleyway next door to a Starbucks, surprising them both.

"You should be careful about pulling a guy into an alleyway," he teased, kissing behind her ear, down her neck and into the crook. "He could get the wrong impression."

"Why Mr Echolls, I'm certain I have no idea what you're implying?" she laughed, using her best Southern Belle imitation. She lifted his shirt and this time her finger tips went straight for his waist, lightly stroking along the top of his pants, then slipping her fingers underneath to stroke the soft, sensitive skin just beneath.

Logan took in a gasp of air, a soft moan escaping on his exhale. "I thought you wanted coffee, Ms Mars." His voice was quiet, deep and thick with the desire he was barely able to suppress.

"This isn't Starbucks?" she looked around with feigned confusion. She slipped her fingers a little lower beneath his waistband, looking him directly in the eye as she did, then flipped them both so he was against the wall. She lean into him to kiss him intently, and felt the bulge in his jeans press into her hip.

"Holy shit, Veronica," he exhaled. "This is not what I thought you meant when you said you needed a pick-me-up." His pants were getting tighter, the heat building, and he wasn't sure how much longer he could carry on with this if he was expected to break away from it before it turned into something more significant.

Veronica stopped for a moment, looked up at him, and in a split-second made a decision. "So pick me up, sailor." She smiled, and looped her arms around his neck, giving him a small nod of encouragement. She had to supress a laugh at the stunned look on his face.

After a few seconds he snapped out of his stunned state and his eyes turned dark with desire, appreciation and love. He placed his hands under her ass and lifted her as she wrapped her legs tight around him. As he turned her around to press her flush to the wall, her thin, summer skirt rode up, exposing her bikini underneath.

"I want you so fucking bad," he growled, his intense gaze paralysing her.

"I'm all yours," she replied, her tone soft but unmistakably firm. It may have been playful banter up until then, but _this_ she really meant. This, he needed to know.

He smiled lovingly, brushed a piece of hair behind her ear, then pulled her even closer to him, pushing themselves hard against the wall to remove any remaining space between them. She began rocking her hips against him and he couldn't hold in the groan that escaped from his throat. His hands slipped under her loose, light top and made their way up her stomach to her breasts. She took in a little gasp of air, but added "keepgoing" when he glanced at her uncertainly. His hands traced the shape of her nipples over her bikini top, and as he began to massage and tweak she let out an involuntary whimper and wrapped her legs even tighter around him, trying to remove space between them that barely existed.

"Jesus Christ," he moaned, unfastening her top few buttons and feeling himself grow uncomfortably hard at the sight of her skimpy bikini top, the outline of her nipples plainly visible through the shiny material. He began to grind against her, wondering whether they were really going to have sex in an alleyway for their first time together. He was just hooking his thumbs into the sides of her bikini bottoms, preparing to somehow slip them off, when the question was answered for him.

They both froze where they were as they heard a loud and deliberate cough. Spinning their heads around they were embarrassed to see a slightly startled guy in his 30's, green Starbucks apron on and hands full of rubbish bags he was obviously bringing out to stack in the alley.

"Fuck," they both muttered. Noticing that her chest was still showing, Logan angled himself to cover her, placing a small, quick kiss on her forehead as he did so.

"Uh, not to interrupt the party or anything, but the garbage gets collected in about five minutes, so…you might want to find somewhere else to do your thing," he advised awkwardly, barely making eye contact with either of them.

"Sorry, man. Thanks," Logan replied, sheepishly.

As the green apron disappeared around the corner, they disentangled from each other and Logan rebuttoned her top.

"A friend of your dad's?" he muttered, teasingly.

She smiled, took a second to inwardly panic that maybe it might have been, then reminded herself that Keith Mars was cunning but not that cunning.

"I guess I now know what they mean by 'blue balls'," she joked, her face flushed.

Logan let out a deep laugh. He loved her unexpectedly dirty mouth.

"Yeah, midnight fuckin' blue," he replied, squirming and re-adjusting his jeans. Although the mood had been effectively killed, he still needed a minute before he would be able to emerge out of the alley. "I don't think baseball is going to do it this time," he quipped, casting his eyes down to his crotch in response to her puzzled look.

"Oh! Yeah, I guess not. Need a hand?" she asked. Logan's eyes grew wide at what he thought she was suggesting.

"As much as I appreciate the suggestion, if we're going to give the garbage men a show we should at least charge them first…"

"No! I meant a hand with some mental imagery to, you know, 'diffuse the situation'," she laughed, adding air quotes. "Perv," she added, grinning.

"Hey, I wasn't the one who started this, _sailor_ ," he threw back, raising a devilish eyebrow. He re-adjusted again, clearly still uncomfortable.

"I bet I can take care of that with just five words," she wagered, relishing the thought of the challenge already.

"And what do I win if you're wrong?" he asked, grabbing her hand and trying to pull her closer.

She slipped out of his grasp and put up her hand, flat palm towards him. "That kind of thing isn't going to help, stop trying to tip the odds in your favour," she warned, mock sternness in her voice. "If I'm wrong, then we go home right now instead of going to the beach, and we finish what we started, like goddamn professionals."

"Deal" he choked out, barely letting her finish her final word.

"You're too easy," she laughed. "Okay, here we go: Principal. Clemens…" she counted off the words on her fingers as she went. "….shaving. his. balls."

The look of horror on Logan's face caused a loud, satisfying laugh to erupt from her throat.

"Oh my God, you win. And not only do you win, I may never get hard again. Congratulations," he groaned. It was only then that he realised he hadn't asked what her terms were before making the bet. He sighed, now realising why she was grinning so wide.

"That's what happens when the blood hasn't returned to your brain yet and you try to take me on," she warned, unable to keep the smirk off her face.

"So what do you get?" he queried, cautious.

She held her chin between her thumb and forefinger, feigning thought for a few seconds before answering, "I win, so…we're going home right now to finish what we started. Like goddamn professionals."

His mouth dropped open slightly, unsure if she was serious. He looked at her expression carefully, trying to interpret joke from genuine suggestion, and got his answer when she waggled her eyebrows at him suggestively.

"That is of course unless you think you'll have a problem with the image of our dear principal floating around your brain?" she asked.

"Not going to be a problem," he whispered into her ear, taking her hand as they left the alleyway.

"There is one slight problem, though," she sighed. "I think we'll need to find a different place to buy coffee." Her nose wrinkled slightly in embarrassment at the memory of the interruptus to their not-quite-coitus.

"Good," he laughed. "Starbucks tastes like shit."


End file.
